


to live (with a knife at your neck)

by Kyele



Series: on my heart (just like a tattoo) [1]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-24
Updated: 2015-06-24
Packaged: 2018-04-06 00:44:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4201401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyele/pseuds/Kyele
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Men like them have to stick together, after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	to live (with a knife at your neck)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Themadwomanwhoisunfortunatelylackingabox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Themadwomanwhoisunfortunatelylackingabox/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Like Lightning and Summer Rain](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4185576) by [Themadwomanwhoisunfortunatelylackingabox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Themadwomanwhoisunfortunatelylackingabox/pseuds/Themadwomanwhoisunfortunatelylackingabox). 



> The Aramis/Lemay is all [Elenduen's](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Elenduen/pseuds/Elenduen) fault. Everything else is due to to the madwoman, who keeps finding new ways to inspire me.

“He’ll live,” Lemay says at last, straightening from Treville’s bed where the Cardinal lies. Treville’s by the window, out of Lemay’s light, but leaning against the wall nonetheless. Without the wall’s support Treville would fall over. And Treville mustn’t fall over. The Captain of the King’s Musketeers doesn’t become faint at the sight of the Cardinal’s throat torn open and bleeding. He doesn’t scream when the knife cuts into it, and he most certainly doesn’t make a bloody mess of the so-called Spanish Ambassador who’d wielded said knife. None of those reactions would be appropriate from one man to another. And so Treville is only leaning against the wall because he’s a little tired. Understandable, for someone who’s foiled an assassination attempt against his King today.

They’d brought Richelieu to Lemay’s dwellings, after the Spanish Ambassador had opened his throat, as the only person Louis (or Treville) trusts with Richelieu’s life. But the physician hadn’t been there. He and Aramis had arranged to study a text together, Lemay’s landlady had said, staring in fright at the bloody Cardinal slumped between two Musketeers. Of all places, Lemay had been at the Musketeers’ garrison. The last place Treville would have looked.

And so here Richelieu is. Here Lemay and Aramis have worked on his throat, while Treville has watched in agonized silence. Here they all are, doctor and lay priest, Captain and Cardinal, and all of the ghosts between them fill the room.

“Captain,” Aramis murmurs at his side. “Captain Treville?”

Treville doesn’t answer. He’s not sure he can speak. It’s not his throat that was nearly cut, but the ache is present nonetheless, equal parts emotion and referred pain.

“Are you hurt?” Aramis asks. “At least sit down.”

Birds are pecking at a bowl of stew, left carelessly on a table in the practice-yard. Treville envies their single-mindedness. Animals don’t have soul mates. Animals don’t know worry or fear. They don’t know love. They don’t know longing. They don’t know loneliness. There are times – of late, many times – when Treville wishes he could be like the birds. Wishes he could open nonexistent wings and fly away, far from the harshness of the way things are, to the happy places he’d dreamed of in his younger days.

A tugging brings Treville’s attention back to the present. Aramis has picked up Treville’s hands; the gloves there are stained a dull red with blood. Armand’s blood. It turns Jean’s gloves the color of the Red Guards. Recruiting him at last, Treville thinks, wondering why the joke doesn’t amuse him. Marking him as Richelieu’s at last.

Aramis is tugging Treville’s gloves off. Treville stares blankly, trying to remember why this is wrong. His mind refuses to work.

“I just want to make sure none of it is yours,” Aramis murmurs. Rough skin appears, reddened with use, but no redder than usual. And there on his wrist the familiar scrawl: _Armand-Jean du –_

Memory returns in a rush. Treville yanks his hand from Aramis, cradles it in his other hand, covering the script.

Too late. Aramis has seen. He’s gone still, eyes fixed on the space beneath Treville’s fingers, and understanding darts lightning-quick through his eyes.

“I’m not hurt,” Treville says. His voice grinds out from between his teeth like cart-wheels dragging through gravel, and Aramis’ eyes dart instinctively to where Lemay is still working patiently, needle and thread closing the wound in Armand’s throat.

Aramis’ throat is the one holding Treville’s attention now. Aramis’ cross hangs there, a simple silver thing that nevertheless means so much. Aramis has always revered the Church and her teachings. Aramis will be disgusted. And Aramis will know to whom to speak and be believed. Even now he’s opening his mouth, no doubt to say something that will lay Treville’s soul as bare as Treville’s heart had been laid when he’d seen the knife slide and blood spurt, bright red and terrifying, from Armand’s throat.

But – “I’ll go bring you a new pair of gloves,” is all Aramis says. The Musketeer makes himself scarce.

Treville watches him go. He can’t even feel relief. Today, tomorrow, one day – some day his day will come. He will pay for what he is.

But perhaps it won’t be today, and for today, that’s enough.

* * *

(Later, a young, hotheaded Musketeer named Havet will waylay Treville on his way to his office, and say that if Treville wants the Cardinal out of his space, Havet and his squadmates will be happy to carry Richelieu to anywhere Treville wants the Cardinal to go. The anger in Havet’s words make it clear that, if Treville tells them to carry Richelieu to the Seine and throw him in, Havet and his squad will do just that. Unspoken but assumed is the belief that Treville doesn’t want Richelieu under his roof for a moment longer than necessary.

And Treville will freeze, traitorous words jostling for primacy in his wounded throat, crowding out the words he knows he must say and yet cannot.

Suddenly Aramis will be there. The Musketeer will swoop in, already shouting, causing a scene. Upbraiding Havet for having forgotten his Christian duty so far as to dice with the life of a man of the Church. Lemay will be at Aramis’ heels, incandescent with fury over someone threatening to harm his patient, in direct violation of the Hippocratic oath and all common decency.

Their shouting will attract others. Soon the whole garrison will be listening to the row. Soon the King’s servants, there to report on Richelieu to the King, will come to find out what the noise is about. Soon both Aramis and Lemay will have spoken so eloquently that Treville will have no choice but to proclaim that Richelieu will remain where he is. Nay, that Richelieu will be treated like a King, that Treville himself will wait on Richelieu hand and foot, until the Cardinal is well enough to not only walk out of the garrison under his own power, but to waltz out, should his Eminence so choose.

And so, when Richelieu drags out his convalescence, when he proclaims himself still fatigued and weak and in need of more rest, it’s obvious to everyone involved that he’s doing it to tweak the Captain’s nose. And when Treville grits his teeth and caters even further to Richelieu’s every whim, when the best food and the sweetest flowers and the oldest books are procured for him and delivered by the Captain himself, everyone nods and winks at Treville’s stubbornness and unwillingness to bend first. The contest of wills between them requires no explanation and raises no suspicions. The Cardinal and the Captain are always battling each other. And for months, for once, the battle may be over who treats the other the best, instead of who treats the other the worst.)

* * *

((Even later, when the lamps are low and the lines on Richelieu’s face have been smoothed out by laudanum and slumber, when the only one still awake – he’d’ve sworn – is Treville himself, holding Richelieu’s still-gloved hand and watching him sleep, Aramis will slip into Treville’s chamber. He’ll bring a book of Latin prayers for the invalid and a cup of strong tea for Treville. When Aramis hands the tea to his Captain, with his hands as bare as his head, Treville won’t need the lamps to read the lettering on Aramis’ inner arm: _François-Edouard Lemay_ _._

“We have to stick together,” Aramis will say quietly, before slipping out and giving the Captain and the Cardinal back their peace.))

* * *

(((And later still, much later, a young boy from Gascony will ride into the garrison. Still grieving his father’s death, it must be God’s own grace that will have protected him, if he’s ridden all the way from Meung with his shirt torn open, exposing the writing on his ribcage for the whole world to see. Perhaps God looks after fools and children after all. But God has sent Charles d’Artagnan to the Musketeers, now. Treville will take up the burden willingly, and though _Athos_ won’t be available, Aramis will, and will tuck the boy under his arm at his Captain’s nod.)))

* * *

((((They have to stick together, after all.))))


End file.
